The productivity of benthic aquatic vegetation can be severely impacted by light limitation due to resuspended sediments. It is important to be able to model this effect to properly assess the impact on a benthic ecosystem that a given amount of total suspended solids (TSS) will have. We developed a surprisingly accurate, yet computationally simple, light model that calculates the spectral irradiance incident on the bottom as a function of TSS. The model is based on a wide range of TSS and inherent optical property (IOP) measurements taken in Laguna Madre in 1997 and 1998. Although this model has not yet been tested in other areas, the basic approach and equations are most likely general, requiring only a few parameter changes based on the optical properties of the suspended sediments in different regions.